Some call them wind turbines, others say windmills, but across Ohio, there are 302 of them. Have you ever wondered what happens to parts of those machines when they aren't used anymore? Usually, they're broken down or sent to a landfill, but one local business found a more sustainable way to use the scraps.
When someone sees a wind turbine, they think power, but when Brain Donahue sees one, he thinks potential.
“I see the future of a product that can go into a community,” said Brian Donahue, the managing partner at Canvus.
The blades used in a wind turbine are made to be quite strong, so they can last years, but once they are retired, they aren't easy to recycle, ending up in landfills and adding to the environmental issue.
“I believe that the landfill is not infinite, right. So how much can you dispose in a landfill? How much can you burn?” said Ica Manas-Zloczower, a Case Western Reserve University Professor of Advanced Materials and Energy and Macromolecular Science and Engineering.
Manas-Zloczower said an option for keeping wind turbine blades out of landfills is by breaking them down.
“The only way to recycle them is by trying to convert those permanent networks into dynamic networks, which can change topology, and consequently, they can be processed by conventional processing techniques,” said Manas-Zloczower.
In an effort to find another solution, Canvus in Avon is using a different method.
“So when we have pieces that we can upcycle, we never want to add to the problem and put fiberglass in the landfill,” Donahue said.
Instead, they are taking those old, retired wind turbine blades and turning them into furniture.
Each wind turbine blade can be 160 feet long, 8 feet wide and weigh around 10 tons, so once they are taken down from the turbine, they must cut the blade into 40 to 50-foot pieces to ship to their facility in Avon.
Once the pieces are there, each piece is cut again, weighed, cleaned up and painted, and other recycled materials are added.
“We use rubber that comes from tires, trucks and cars. It comes from shoes that are coming out of the factory or used and collected and ground up. And we use a board that's made of mixed plastics that they're pulling out of the ocean from the carpet industry,” said Donahue.
On average, they can create 40 pieces of furniture from each blade to make things like benches, tables, and fountains. The pieces that aren’t used still don’t end up in the landfill.
“We shred it, hopefully, to be used as a product like an aggregate and asphalt, and they're building roads or concrete,” said Donahue.
The goal is to create something that will last in the community and give that strong windmill material a sustainable second life.
“A typical park bench or a picnic table in the park will last five to seven years. This will last 20 to 30 years out there, virtually maintenance-free,” said Donahue.
Canvus estimates every year they will be able to keep 1,500 to 2,000 blades out of the landfills. He said many companies have bought their benches and donated them to places like the Great Lake Science Center.
